Wrestling Rankings, and a Look at the Weekend
New team and individual rankings are out this week, and the Illini remained relatively stable in both. Here are the latest:
The Illini are #22 as a team here, which is up a couple of spots from last week. John Dergo remains at #2 at 184 pounds; Ryan Prater (141), Jordan Blanton (174) and Patrick Bond (197) are all ranked #14 this week, with Bond dropping out of the top ten after a loss to an unranked Indiana wrestler. Eric Terrazas moves up one spot to #19 at 149 pounds.
Amateur Wrestling News Individual
Terrazas is unranked by AWN, but the other four wrestlers ranked by Intermat are also listed here. John Dergo is 4th, Jordan Blanton 9th, Patrick Bond 11th and Ryan Prater 14th.
W.I.N Magazine team and individual
In addition to team dual rankings, W.I.N. also has what they call a Tournament Point Index, ranking how they project each team would score at the NCAA Tournament. The Illini rank 21st here with 18.5 tournament points. They are unranked in W.I.N.'s dual rankings. Individually, Dergo again leads the way with a #2 ranking. Prater is at #14, Blanton #17 and Bond #18.
This Week's Schedule:
Friday 2/5
Minnesota at Illinois 7pm
Wisconsin at Purdue 6pm
Northwestern at Penn State 6pm
Michigan at Ohio State 6pm
Michigan State at Central Michigan 6:30pm
Saturday 2/6
Iowa at Utah Valley State
Minnesota at Indiana 6:30pm
Sunday 2/7
Wisconsin at Illinois 1pm
Northwestern at Ohio State 10am
Michigan State at Purdue 12pm
Michigan at Penn State 12pm
I've picked the winners of each dual above by putting my predicted winner in bold type. My predicted Illinois win above against Minnesota assumes that #1 Jayson Ness (133) will not wrestle against the Illini, as he has yet to wrestle in a Big Ten dual. If he does wrestle, that would change my pick in what I think will be a very close dual. There are a lot of tossup weights in this dual, so you won't want to miss it!
I missed last weekend, but we'll see how my prognostication skills fare starting tomorrow night. You're welcome to question any of my picks in the comments, or you can e-mail me at the address below. Thanks for reading.
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